I got a Vespa 50 from my mother when I was 12 in 1970. In Italy 14 was the official age to ride a license-plate-free moped. It was total freedom for me.

At age 19 I got a barnstormer of a Benelli 650 Tornado, Italy's answer to the Bonneville. It didn't leak oil but the electrics were awful and it vibrated my glasses off my helmet-free nose. But it also wrenched my arms from my shoulder sockets when I opened it up.

Motorcycles today are so much better. Even so I have nostalgia for the simplicity of the era. I knew it was good at the time.

Me around March, 1968 on my first bike. A CB 160 I bought brand new in March of that year and was my only transport (to everywhere, onroad or offroad) for about a year. According to a note on the back of the pic my first lowside ever was accomplished in May that year on an off camber left hand curve at exactly 60 mph (my top safe speed for that curve up to that day when I was racing a rainstorm home and lost).